ISLE FILE
Gesser ceremony postponed

Advertiser Staff

You'd like your star quarterback to throw passes like lightning bolts, but you don't want him to get hit by one.

Because of overnight thunderstorms in the area, Washington State postponed yesterday morning's scheduled unveiling of its huge banner promoting quarterback Jason Gesser of Honolulu for the Heisman Trophy.

The banner is to be hung on a 100-foot tall grain elevator in Dusty, Wash. (population 12), said to be at the approximate Center of Nowhere.

"We drove by there Sunday for the first time," Gesser said yesterday. "It's a big elevator."

The banner is a part-serious kickoff of Washington State's campaign for Gesser as the nation's best football player, and part spoof of rival Oregon's placing of a 10-story billboard in midtown Manhattan last year to publicize its Heisman candidate, Joey Harrington. He didn't win.

Gesser's banner will be hung in a ceremony at 10 a.m. today — weather permitting.

PREP BASKETBALL

Kalaheo to retire Richardson's jersey: Brandy Richardson's Kalaheo High School career will officially end Saturday — a year after her graduation — when her

No. 15 jersey is retired at a ceremony at about 5 p.m. in the school gym, following the final summer league game that day.

Richardson, now a scholarship player at the University of California-Santa Barbara, will be present. Coach Chico Furtado hopes many of her former teammates and former opponents will attend as well.

"We're going to put one of her jerseys in a frame on the gym wall, and give the other one to her," Furtado said.

During Richardson's four years as a starter, the Mustangs won four O'ahu Interscholastic Association titles, played in four state tournaments — twice reaching the championship game — and compiled an overall record of 101-8.

Kalaheo has retired one other basketball jersey — the No. 20 worn by Alika Smith of the boys team.